Speed Racer (AA)
(Gabe opens the door.) Gabe: Sage, did you go? (Gabe looks around and opens the door in Sage's room.) Gabe: Sage? (Gabe looks in Sage's room that's he's not here.) (Gabe sits in a chair.) Gabe: Sage has disappeared. (Flashbacks of Sage torturing Gabe are shown) Sage: My favorite punching bag is Gabe and is why I devised a punishment that is both cruel AND unusual! Gabe: Sage has disappeared! (Gabe then proceeds to have some fun like Kevin in Home Alone. First he's seen spinning in the chair cheering in delight. The next scene has him playing with toys) Gabe: I'm just a Diva! Please don't hurt me! Randy Orton RKO out of nowhere! (He's now using Sage's card to order on the phone) Gabe: Yeah. I want to order extra large cheese pizza. Wait. TWO extra large cheese pizzas. My name? Bennett T. Sage. (We get a shot of some pizza slices and crusts on the table while Gabe's watching some of Sage's anime while eating pizza) Gabe: Hey Sage, I'm watching your secret hentai! You better come out and pound me! (He realizes what he just said) Not like that. (A headshot from said hentai is shown while orgasmic moans are heard. Gabe drinks a sip of beer before getting to a rather wrong scene from his perspective, reaching for the remote) Gabe: Sage! (We now cut to Sage tied up and blindfolded by a red tie on a familiar leather couch. Gabe's cry of Sage's name is heard, waking him up, making him realize his situation, trying to get out) Sage: Where am I? Voice: You're in Hell, Sage. Sage: New Jersey? (The Nostalgia Critic is the one behind this kidnapping) NC: Oh for the love of! (NC removes his tie from Sage's face) Sage: Oh! Hey! Long time no see! NC: Yes. Too long. Sage: I, uh, see you got me at a disadvantage here. Don't suppose you'd let me go, would you? NC: No. No I wouldn't. (NC's left eye is twitching) Sage: Well would you scratch my nose at least? Got this really irritating little-- (NC slaps him across the face) Okay, uh, I get that you're angry. NC: Angry? No, Sage, I'm way past angry. (He gets up in Sage's face) You see, over the past few months, I've been experiencing...how would you call it? Violent fits of uncontrollable rage? That it? Sage: Yeah, I think that sounds appropriate. NC: Yeah. Well, do you know why I've been experiencing violent fits of uncontrollable rage? Hmm? Do you? Sage: I'm gonna hazard a guess and say it's because of me? NC: (poking Sage's chest) That's right, fucko! Sage: What did I do? NC: Oh let's see... Goading me into heavy Chicago traffic, tricking my brother into constantly quoting Dune. Sage: So because I trolled you a little, you drugged and kidnapped me...to do what, exactly? NC: I think you would've gotten it by now, Sage. What else would we be doing? Sage: *sigh* Okay, what are we reviewing? NC: Oh, just a little movie from 2008. Sage: 2008? I don't do 2008. NC: Well 2008 is gonna do you, and it's gonna do you...(He pulls up the DVD case for Speed Racer) hard! Sage: What, really? NC: Yeah, really. What, you never seen this before? Sage: No, no I have! It's just... NC: It's just...what? Sage: It's just...not terrible? (NC drops the case and his eye twitches again before finally getting to the opening credits for Anime Abandon. Afterward we cut to the Critic and Sage, still tied up, in front of a camera) NC: Hello, I'm the Nostalgia Critic. I remember it so you don't have to! Sage: (Nervous) And I'm...Sage (Smiles hoping to not anger the Critic) NC: It must be hard to follow up a cultural touch stone! NC (v/o): The Wachowski's were on top of the world by the early 2000s, having made a trilogy of films that changed Sci-Fi forever. Maybe not for the better, but they changed it all the same! Sage (v/o): While The Matrix trilogy ended on a pretentious and overwrought note, The Wachowski's still had enough clout to pretty much have carte blanche on whatever project suited their fancy. Including, penning the script for V For Vendetta. Sage: (to NC) Which I'm surprised you haven't reviewed yet. NC. (In a creepy tone and smile) Patience my love, patience! (poking Sage's nose) NC (v/o): Still, a whole 5 years went by without the brothers...well, now sisters (both directors are now transgender) having directed anything. What would be their triumphant return to prestige and relevancy? NC: Why, it's none other than the bleeding eyesore, Speed Racer! NC (v/o): A film that dares to ask: "How fast can we make the audience go blind?" Speed Racer is the kind of movie that doesn't even feel like it was even made! It had to be summoned from the deepest, darkest pits of CGI hell! (picture is shown of the devil from Spawn) Ok, 2nd deepest. Sage: Well, Speed Racer does fall in a number of aspects... NC: (interrupts) ALL ASPECTS! Sage: I'm saying that...(trying not to anger him) it just deserves your disdain, not this pure vitriol of yours. NC: Ok, did you crack you head when you were in my trunk? Because I don't think chloroform should make you this delusional! Sage: And you know that how? NC: Sometimes, Malcolm gets a little mouthy and needs a little nap. (Cut to Malcolm in another room sleeping next to some cardboard boxes, making noises as like a kid having a bad dream. Cut back to Sage and NC.) Sage: Why does anyone work for you!? NC: (avoids question and turns to the camera) This is Speed Racer! (Sage looks worried) NC (v/o): We begin with a flash back that tells us all about a kid named Speed Racer, who's REALLY into racing! Yeah, who would have thought. Speed's Teacher: (to Mom Racer) Your Son seems to interested in only one thing. All he talks about he seems capable of thinking about... NC: Is your gigantic rack. Teacher: ...is automobile racing. NC: Oh yes, automobile racing! Yes oh course, course that! Sage (v/o): Yep, that's Susan Sarandon playing Speed Racer's mom, who's about to learn something very harsh about her son. Teacher: Is your husband's name Rex? Mom Racer: No, that's his older brother Rex. Why? Teacher: (picks up a piece of paper) This is the test he turned in last week (It's a multiple choice exam that spells out on the paper "Go Rex Go") Sage: That's right, your son's an idiot! And Sarandon's expression pretty much says it all. Sage/Mom Racer: (looking a little embarrassed) Ooh...ah...well...uh...yeah he is. NC (v/o): But the school bell rings and Speed is off like a shot to get picked up by his older brother, Rex, and...by god, what the hell kind of world are they living in? It's like if the Leave It To Beaver neighborhood if it was rendered by the guys behind Jimmy Neutron. NC: Actually, why are the backgrounds all CG? Sage: Well, it is based off an anime. NC: But why do you even have real actors? Why not just have them CG if everything else is CG? NC (v/o): It's not like Who Framed Roger Rabbit, where Eddie (Valiant) looking out of place in Toontown was all part of the joke. Everyone here is treating the world like it always looked like if Dr. Seuss just gave up! Sage (v/o): Granted if it was all CG, it'd definitely be less jarring. But, I think it looks alright when you realize it's supposed to be a cartoon. As far as why there's actual actors instead of CG characters, I think it's because the Wachowski's wanted to see what could do and achieve by blending the two and prove that an anime adaptation can be made. NC: What are you talking about? Sage: Look, there's been a ton of anime based adaptations that have been stuck in development hell, for god knows how long, because everyone and their mother has been scared to actually pull the trigger! Sage (v/o): James Cameron has been battling for over a decade to get a Battle Angel Alita film made and Ghost In The Shell took 7 years before principal photography even began. Cowboy Bebop has certainly been milled around too and Akira is infamous for being greenlit, only to have production stop 4 times and don't even get me started on Robotech! NC (v/o): I wasn't, actually. Sage (v/o): The point is that Speed Racer is the first real, big budget, Hollywood adaptation of an anime that was made it was supposed to be a gateway for future movies to be released. NC: So you're saying because of Speed Racer, we got Dragonball Evolution and Astro Boy? Sage: Well, Astro Boy was fine (NC looks at Sage, "really?") -ish (NC then gives look, "sure") NC (v/o): We cut back to the...present day, I think? As the now fully grown Speed Racer, played by Emile Hirsch, suits up and begins the race. And if the CGI looked bad before, it literally hurts to look at now! The colors are garishly bright, the camera jitters like a 5 year old that has to go pee, and (frustrated) IT. JUST. WON'T. STOP! (Speed avoids a crashing car in the race. Sparky, Speed's mechanic, watches from the tech pit.) Sparky: (through head set) Great moves, Speed! (Before the other car crashes, the foam comes out of the car surrounding the driver, Snake Oiler, and protecting him. His car explodes as the foam forms a ball bouncing the driver around the track.) NC: So, Speed turns his vehicle, sideswiped the other guy's car, causing him to crash, turning into a crunchberry, and bounce off? Sage: Hey, how else are we supposed to know he survived that horrific car crash, if he didn't have that magic force field bubble? Sage: (as Audience of Race) Wait! No, he didn't die in a flaming chasm of gasoline and carnage! See, he magically bounced off like he was fucking, Kirby's Dreamland! (Back to normal, Sighs) Alright, in all seriousness, I'm more on your side than not, as a lot is happening at once and since all the colors are blending together. It makes it that much more difficult to differentiate objects in the frame. Compound matters is that the speed in which everything is moving at is dictating the edited, which is relentlessly quick! It's an exhausting sift. Sage: Which is kind of the point. I mean, it is a white knuckle race after all. NC: I get that, but it doesn't mean it has to be so Incredibly painful to sit through!